The Invitational, Week 8: Poke Us Till We Giggle

This week’s contest: Write a ‘poke,’ or a joke recast as a rhyming poem. Plus the winners of our first on-Substack caption contest.

Before we get to the poems, a one-question poll based on my ongoing brush with death, via Covid, which got me thinking Big, Existential Thoughts About The Meaning of Life.  My terrible editor, Tom The Butcher, helped me formulate this. So, here we go. Let’s call it a Gene Pool Gene Poll:

The question: Do you believe that humans most likely:
1) are highly sophisticated biological machines, meat and bones and nerves and chemical reactions, combining to create, via Darwinian evolution, a form of self-awareness akin to Artificial Intelligence.
2) are imbued with some sort of naturally occurring force as yet undiscovered by science that imparts a sense of self and cognition.
3) have a supernatural component such as a soul.

With the eternal verities aside, we proceed on to insipid doggerel.

A Fruitful Encounter

A baby kumquat cried and cried.
She said to me: “How sad I am.”
And then explained, all teary-eyed:
“My mother’s in a jam.”

A Show of Hands

Tick tock tick tock tick tock.
Yesterday I ate a clock.
I do not know what you're presuming,
But  it was VERY time-consuming.

Honkering Down

In the grocery store a snowman
Was roaming the produce rows.
It was odd, but made some sense —
He was simply picking his nose.

Question to a Job Seeker 

A guy with a résumé had on the desk lain it.
And the manager, reading it, sensing a Fail,
Said: “There's a four-year gap. Can you explain it?”
The applicant said, “I spent four years in Yale.”
“That's great,” said the manager, “we all love a scholar!”
“You're hereby hired — welcome aboard, Bob!”
Bob smiled and relaxed and loosened his collar …
“Thank you,” he gushed. “I really needed this yob.”

By Gene Weingarten and Pat Myers, Czar and Empress of The Invitational

This week, for Week 8 of The Invitational:   Recast a joke – something with a punchline – as a rhyming poem, or “poke,” a term Gene coined years ago.  As the examples above show (they’re from his old columns), you have great leeway in both form and substance; the jokes can be short and dumb, long and elegant, or anywhere in between.  The jokes can be old chestnuts; the originality here is in the poems. The poems can fit any rhyme scheme or genre.  They can even be risque, now that we are freed of the corporate yoke of propriety.   They can be parodies of existing poems, or something you simply made up to convey your joke.  They can have titles or not, as is your wont.  See, it’s easy! 
(The Czar is most proud of this lengthy poke, a loose parody of “The Raven.” It involves a chicken, shocking vulgarity and the specter of death by torture.)

 As always, you may submit up to 25 entries, all at once (which we like) or separately.  You don’t need any special formatting – just write it as what it ought to look like.  

CLICK HERE FOR THIS WEEK’S ENTRY FORM.   

Deadline is 4 p.m. ET Saturday, March 4. Results will run here in The Gene Pool on Thursday, March 9. 

Winner receives these nifty socks on which are printed sandaled feet, complete with multicolored pedicure. They just fit the Empress’s size 7 feet, so they might be better for the Junior Future Loser of your choice.  

 First Offenders receive the Fir Stink for their first ink: a smelly tree-shaped air “freshener.”

The last contest results are below, but first two paragraphs of boring but necessary boilerplate:

After the intro (which you are reading now), there will be some early questions and answers  --  and then I'll keep adding them as the hour progresses and your fever for my opinions grows and multiplies and metastasizes.  To see those later Q&As,  just refresh your screen every once in a while. 

As always, you can also leave comments. They’ll congregate at the bottom of the post, and allow you to annoy and hector each other and talk mostly amongst yourselves. Though I will stop in from time to time.

First-Round Daft Pics: Captions From Invitational Week 6

In our first caption contest of the Substacked Invitational, we presented the seven motley images below and received about 900 entries, the most so far in our new home.  This week’s back ’n’ forth (it varies by the week):  The Emp winnowed the list – as always, the writers’ names aren’t attached when she sees it – to about 200; the Czar chopped it down to about 35;  and then the E put a few back in and chose the top four.  

The winner of the tin of Instant Underpants:  The remake of Hitchcock’s “The Birds” lacked a little something. (Duncan Stevens, Vienna, Va.) 

“Wow, inflation has really gotten ridiculous!”  (Jesse Frankovich, Lansing, Mich.)

Keepers at the Dallas Zoo didn’t notice the substitutions for weeks.   (Sam Mertens, Silver Spring, Md.) 

Merch of the Penguins  (Chris Doyle,  Denton, Tex.) 

Redesigned Chinese balloons easily evaded U.S. radar defenses.  (Kevin Dopart, Washington, D.C.) 

 The flamingo swore she would never trust a dating app again. (Mark Raffman, Reston, Va.) 

“Well, Sid, I’ll tell ya – it beats being an inflatable love doll.”  (Jon Ketzner, Cumberland, Md.) 

The penguins were actually on a street in Alexandria, Va.; photo taken by the Empress during a walk in January;

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First runner-up:  And thus, with the executioner summoned, Western civilization would be spared from yoga for another 400 years. (Jon Carter, Fredericksburg, Va.) 

At that moment, the king conceived the idea of underpants. (Terri Berg Smith, Rockville, Md.)  

The world is introduced to its first stuntman, Medieval Knievel. (Jesse Frankovich) 

 As if his death sentence weren’t enough, James had to hand-walk to the lion’s mouth. (Leif Picoult, Rockville, Md.) 

Early gynecological practice gets off to a rough start.  (Rob Cohen, Potomac, Md.) 

Medieval perverts could even find upskirt pics in illuminated manuscripts. (J. Larry Schott, West Plains, Mo.) 

 “No, Melchior, the baby Jesus probably won’t care about your gymnastics skills. Let’s just go with the myrrh.”  (Duncan Stevens, Vienna, Va.) 

The picture is actually of the princess Salome dancing on her hands before the feasting Herod and Herodias, from the 14th-century English missal “The Taymouth Hours.”

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Picture C, below, in a .gif enhancement from Loser (and Imperial Scion) Valerie Holt.   The (static) engraving is from an 1898 edition of the Illustrated Police News.

Dianne Feinstein recalls the challenges of her first day in the Senate. (Jon Carter) 

“Keep my wife’s name out of your effin’ mouth.”  (Roy Ashley, Washington, D.C.) 

"I told you to unwrap your candy before the show starts!"  (Judy Freed, Deerfield Beach, Fla.) 

Late arrivals now become part of the show. (Paul MF Styrene, Olney, Md.)

Despite an unfortunate typo, the new sport of mixed marital arts proved wildly popular. (David Sarokin, Washington, D.C.) 

 The caption on the original engraving:  “A fair acrobat soundly thrashes a man who has made himself objectionable to her father.”

When chessmen realize they’ve been watching too much pawn. (Jesse Frankovich)  

The Fourth Wise Man arrived too late, but his gift of amphetamines helped keep them all awake on the long journey home. (Jeff Shirley, Richmond, Va.)  

After mastering the dark arts, Nancy Pelosi was able to turn key Republicans to stone.  (Neil Kurland, Elkridge, Md.) 

“So how much longer does this State of the Union thing go on?” (Steve Bremner, Philadelphia)  

The “Lewis Chessmen,” made probably in Norway of walrus ivory and dating to the 12th or 13th century, were discovered on the shore the Isle of Lewis, Scotland, in 1831. 

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 “And then I chased the cat out of the trash. No need to thank me.” (Jon Carter)  

 “You know, feeding me the scraps directly would save us both a lot of trouble.” (Judy Freed)  

After the earth’s atmosphere shrank his spacecraft and caused him to assume the shape of a household pet, Zorg hoped his eyes would not give him away. (Mark Raffman)  

Feared even more than the Cone of Shame is the Collar of Culpability. (Jeff Contompasis, Ashburn, Va.) 

Ranger hadn’t believed them when they said he’d go blind if he kept raiding the trash can.  (Pam Shermeyer, Lathrup Village, Mich.)  

The Empress’s beloved dog Henry upon greeting the returning family at the front door one afternoon (pre-digital photo from the late 1990s). The Royal Consort’s paper-clip repair on the lid’s hinge continues to hold to this day. 

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Second runner-up:  Somehow fame and fortune on the runway still left Ingrid feeling hollow inside. (Jeff Contompasis)

“All my other clothes are from L.L. Bean.”  (Jon Ketzner)

“Hey, you jerk. My crotch is down here!” (Jon Gearhart, Des Moines) 

It’s even more obscene with the mop handle left in. (Gary Crockett, Chevy Chase, Md.) 

The photo: In Paris this month, haute couture from the Viktor & Rolf show.

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Third runner-up:  Dr. Frankenstein soon learned that it wasn’t easy working from home if you owned a cat. (Kevin Dopart) 

True, Ginger was thrown out of the house  — but she did get a meaty severance package. (Stu Segal, “Southeast U.S.”)

He regretted having used his third wish to “get my junk inside a little pussy.”  (Mark Raffman)  

"What's the matter, Gene? Cat got your dong?" (John Winant, Annandale, Va.)  

“No, no — you were supposed to draw Cock Robin! (Dottie Gray, Alexandria, Va.)  

A detail from a cryptic 1555 engraving in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. More on it here. 

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“Daft Pics” in the headline for the results is by Kevin Dopart.

Still running – deadline one moment before midnight Friday, Feb. 24  (well, if you’re a day late this week, it’s okay – we’re busy till late Saturday afternoon, to be honest):  Our Week 7 contest for ideas for novel artworks.  Click here or type in bit.ly/inv-week-7. 

Sunday, March 19: Ingest foodstuffs with genuine Losers!  Next month’s Loser Brunch will be at the Spanish Diner, José Andres’s home-cooking place in downtown Bethesda, Md. (free parking in the garages). The Empress and Royal Consort plan to be there.  More info and RSVP at Our Social Engorgements  on the Losers’ website, NRARS.org.     

Banter and share humor with the Losers and the Empress in the Style Invitational Devotees group on Facebook; join (tell them you came from The Gene Pool) and the Devs will anagram your name every which way. And see more than 1,000 classic Invite entries in graphic form, also on FB, at Style Invitational Ink of the Day.

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And now, on to your questions and my answers.

Q: I hope you get well quickly and completely. My question, regarding your last post: What makes you think I am qualified to judge whether you are a saint?

A: I believe you are every bit as qualified to decide who is a saint as is, say, the College of Cardinals. You wouldn’t be as good as the triumvirate of Dr. Fauci, Michelle Obama, and Tom Hanks. Any other nominations?

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Q: You famously got fired from WaPo chatdom for complaining when the Post switched to an evil hard-to-use chat software. I didn't like the new software, still don't like it, in fact stopped participating in chats there altogether because I couldn't get the hang of it and . . . I have to admit that this version you're using now is even worse. Does this qualify as irony?

A: Explain why it is harder, and maybe I can get it fixed. The substack people respond well to suggestions. As of now, “Comments” are robust, but I definitely get fewer “questions,” and many fewer that arise organically from the ongoing discussion, but I don’t know why. So please clarify. At the very least, your response to this, here, will provide one more “question.”

Q: Have you watched Dopesick, the miniseries about the opioid crisis? I had no idea of the sheer evil of the origin — one very rich, unregulated family.

A: No, but I just finished watching “The Crime of the Century,” co-produced by the Wapo, and featuring the work of my friends Sari Horwitz and Scott Higham. Same subject, except unlike Dopesick this is not fictionalized, featuring actors — this is a documentary featuring real players in the sick drama. The show is extraordinarily powerful, and sickening. This one goes way past the Sacklers — the unregulated greed across the industry was jaw-dropping, and extended to dozens of criminally liable doctors, who dispensed pills in fatal numbers because they were bribed. It also featured many totally gratuitous scenes of strippers, for some reason.

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Q: What do you consider to be "old age?"

A: I can say definitively that one hits old age at 71 years, four months and 17 days, which was the day I got Covid.

Q: When you are working on a story do you use a tape recorder to get exact quotes of your subject?

A: I don’t and never have, for one principal reason: If I have a recorder going, I am less involved (or not involved) in note-taking, so I am constantly terrified it will stop recording, and I won’t know it, and so I spend the whole interview worrying inordinately about whether it is working, and checking it, and not listening carefully enough, or thinking carefully enough, to what the person is saying. I do take good and fast notes, and am not bashful about asking someone who talks fast to slow down, or stop periodically, so my notes can catch up. I have only once been accused of getting a quote wrong.

Another quirk: On the advice of counsel, long ago, I seldom keep my notes after a story is published. Should you get sued, you can rely on your reputation, he said, but if an attorney gets hold of your notes, he or she can twist them into pretzels, raising issues of doubt where none actually exist.

Q: I eagerly read your report on the “Almost Home” phenomenon, hoping to find discussion of the same issue with #1. Maybe it is more of an issue with the female anatomy, but I find myself dashing from the door to the loo when I come back from a walk—when I would have been fine walking an hour more. And liquid intake has little to do with it. I wonder if there is a similar explanation. Did you and your experts discuss that or did you think the Nobel committee would only be interested in solid waste?

A: This in in reference to this fine chat with Dr. Satish Rao, the noted poop-movemet expert, which I linked to in the last Gene Pool. I have re-checked the explanation, and I concluded that the urinary sphincter was not one of those rare places in the body where the autonomic (involuntary) and voluntary systems coexist, the way they do in the rectum. They can confuse each other with strange stuttering interactions.

ButI then consulted medical texts and found I was wrong: “Controlling the outflow of urine are two valves, or sphincters, located in the bladder neck and earliest portion of the urethra. The bladder neck sphincter is under involuntary (autonomic) control while the urethral sphincter has both voluntary and involuntary components.” That’s the formula for the almost-home phenomenon, where your conscious brain is at war with your unconscious body. You are right!

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Q: Dave Barry used to comment on phrases that would be great names for bands. Do you have any favorites yourself?

A: Mine is a real band: “The The.” And they were good.

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TIMELY TIP: If you're reading this on an email:   Click here to get to my webpage, then click on the top headline (In this case, “The Invitational, Week 8…” for my full column, and comments, and real-time questions and answers, and be able to refresh and see new questions and answers that appear as I regularly update the post.

Q: I don't share your level of frustration with the Spelling Bee, but what do you think of the oddity that it accepts PAPPY, but not MAMMY? Chris

A: I believe I know why.  They are SUPER sensitive to any hint of impropriety, particularly racism.  I suspect they feel “mammy” has racial implications.   At least several months ago they were also not accepting “spook.”  They also didn’t take “chink.” Obviously, these are words with perfectly normal primary meanings. I am not sure how I feel about this, but it is my duty to officially scoff.

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Q: Is there anything you've been bitter about in your life? How did you get over it?

A: There’s one, and I am still getting over it.  

Q: Don't you think many in the GOP want Trump to go to prison (or at least be somehow barred from running again) almost as much as the Dems do, so he gets out of the way, and doesn't split the party?

A: I suspect you might be right, but rest assured these same Republicans will scream bloody murder if the IS indicted and claim that he is being railroaded, framed, by the fiends across the aisle. 

Q: Are there any entertainers who you're still captivated by -- and remain a fan of their art -- even if you've come to believe they're terrible people? Where do you draw the line?

A: Louis C.K.   Roman Polanski.   Pablo Picasso.  Woody Allen.  Scott Adams.   I don’t really have a line.  I tend to judge people and their art differently.    Oddly – I can’t figure out why – all of these miserable people are men.   Well, there’s Victoria Jackson, but I was never really a big fan. 

Q: If you could throw a pie in anyone's face at any moment in history without consequences, who would it be and why? And what kind of pie would it be? Please credit me as the Avenger of the Pie. You shall not know my true identity unless you ask Gregory Koch if he is the Pie Avenger in which case he will either say yes or lie.

A: Oddly enough, David Simon and I wrote a screenplay on exactly this subject many years ago.  It would have to be someone who would get so angry at the affront he would sputter and stammer and look terrible in the terrible humorlessness of his response.   That sort of lets Trump out – he’d know how to turn it into a vicious joke.  Right now, I think Tucker Carlson. 

You also asked a nearly identical question about mooning someone.   I know who I would do that to.  Buzz Aldrin.  He would get it and just laugh.

Q: Gene --- The human mind is endlessly fascinating. Several years ago international headlines told of a visitor to the Uffizi Gallery in Florence who had a heart attack while contemplating Botticelli's “The Birth of Venus.”  It turns out that this was not a mere coincidence. Apparently, there is a fairly long history behind the notion that art can be so overwhelming as to cause physical illness. The phenomenon even has a name; it's called the “Stendhal syndrome.” Ever had anyone faint dead away after reading one of your pieces ? Of course, you can also add this to your list of excuses for nodding out during a play or movie.

A: Not faint dead away, but I know of someone who vomited after reaching a line in my story about babies who died in hot cars. It was a description of what the baby did before she died. It was horrifying.

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Q: Gene --- Something I've been meaning to ask you for years (okay --- the last five minutes). Where do you stand on Shakespeare authorship ? I prefer Archibald Mulliner’s explanation. In a P.G. Wodehouse story, he is told that Bacon wrote plays for Shakespeare and remarks that it was "dashed decent of him," but suggests he may have only done it because he owed Shakespeare money.

A:  That’s funny, and I don’t know how much you are trolling me, but Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare.  The proof is ample. 

Q: A few chats ago, you proposed possibly writing feature profiles about the first 3 people (or possibly their proxies) who succeed at getting 25 people to sign up for a year's subscription to The Gene Pool. When will you launch that challenge? (Related to that, when are you going to stop making this 100% free?)

A: I am in discussion with Biff Wellington, my  substack editor, right now, about both of these.  More on this shortly. 

Q: As your humble (if not obedient) servant, I have selected the Word of the Day. it's the outstanding rhinotillexomania or, obsessive nose-picking. Fortunately, no word yet from otolaryngologists as to what constitutes obsessive so — pick away. Probably should also include pentheraphobia or, the fear of your mother-in-law. Somehow, the two seem to go together.

A: I like the first one, but would add a syllable for a variation:  rhinotillexomaniatableosis, which is compulsive nose picking then smearing on the bottom of furniture.

Q: This is Gene. I dunno if any of you have noticed it, but I have solved the problem of long delays between new answers. I figured it out in a Covid fever dream.

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Q: Are you taking the Paxlovid? I did and it was the worst part of it. Strange taste accompanied by diarrhea

A: I did not take it. It was contraindicated for me. I’m glad I didn’t. You tend to relapse. I know someone this happened to. I seem to be doing well.

Q: If you could be anybody else -- at any time in history -- who would you like to swap places with?

A: I wouldn’t change the time period much, because life expectancies were lower and subject to things like “the ague” or “St. Vitus Dance.”   I’m going with Dylan in 1963 and beyond. 

Q:  About the Classified Documents, I haven’t been able to find the answers to these questions. It's much bigger than the guys caught taking them home. Why are these docs handed out so freely? Where is the Chain of Custody for them? Are they not recollected at the end of a meeting?

A: Two answers.  I suspect there are waay too many of those documents, so they are easy to lose track of.  And second, I doubt if the ones Biden and Trump had were presented at meetings.  I think they were presented to them, in a stack.  A stack looks pretty much the same if a single document was not returned.

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Q: Interesting that studies have shown ‘full-frontal’ swear words are more offensive than their ‘asterisked,’ but equally understood version. Apparently it has to do with being able to (in writing at least…) show respect to the reader, while using either something integral to what is being communicated or making a ‘statement’ which otherwise could be involuntarily off-putting.The question remains, however, how you do the same in speaking. Of course, you could always substitute an equivalent word in another language — the French ‘merde!’ sounding so much more elegant that its English counterpart. Another study, btw, suggests that people who swear are perceived as more trustworthy than those who are less potty-mouthed. So clearly anyone looking to a career in politics should cuss up a storm; saves actually having to do something worthy of trust.Where do you sit on the matter ?

A: I think someone should persuade Kevin McCarthy that that is the way to go, and that it will endear him to his electorate.

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Q: Let's address "neopronouns" shall we ? It seems the singular ‘they,’ was readily used by such literary greats as WS, Jane Austen and Emily Dickinson and, in fact, can be traced back to ‘The Canterbury Tales’ It was used not to be gender neutral, but to describe a specific role. It wasn’t until the 18th c. onwards that we started using male pronouns when describing someone of a non-specific gender in writing. Many linguists now expect “they/their/them” to become generally acceptable because they are already embedded in the language and part of the grammar. The jury is still out, however, on the hundreds of new gender neutral pronouns developed and in development. Linguists abhor a vacuum (even an imaginary one). What say you ?

A: I say, with unaccustomed humility, that I am the worst person to ask about this. I am old and hidebound and cannot get past the wince at the use of “they” to mean “him or her.” This is for younger people to accept or reject, and I will go along with their wisdom. I will never relent on “infer” meaning '“imply,” or on the acceptance of, say, “irregardless.”

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Q: Did you notice the writer of Burt Bacharach's obit is Tim Greiving?

A: That becomes an aptonym only if it was a VERY positive obit.

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Q: So, how is the Covid going?

A: I hope to have a full, entertaining report for you on Tuesday, assuming I am still alive. There have been some interesting and unusual elements. I am fading a bit now, and we’ve hit the hour mark, so I’m calling this one done. Obviously, keep sending in questions and comments. Pat will keep lurking, I suspect, and I hold questions and use them later.

Thanks so much. This was my favorite Gene Pool so far.